Devastated
by DarkandtwistyGirl
Summary: Sequel to My Brother’s Heart. AU. Stanford era. My brother’s heart is beating inside my chest, oh god, how did this happen to us! Dean is left devastated, can he come to terms with everything that’s happened? *Complete*
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or the characters, and chances are that I never will.**

**Thanks to everyone who responded to the last chapter of To The Bone! I hope that you will enjoy this new fic, it's the sequel to My Brother's Heart that I have promising for way too long.**

**And on top of this fic, though I'll probably regret it later, I'm also starting another new fic, When There's No More Tomorrow, please check it out.**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

After the funeral, John and Dean left Palo Alto in a hurry. They didn't have a destination in mind, all they knew was that they had to get away from where they had been forced to say goodbye to their beloved youngest.

* * *

John was driving, while Dean lay in the backseat, resting, or so it would seem. In reality Dean was lying there, silently trying to process everything that had happened, his baby brother was gone, he'd been killed in a senseless act of violence. And now Sam's heart was beating within his chest, the product of a bizarre twist of fate, from what his father had said, he, Dean was on the verge of death, on the brink of falling into a coma that he wouldn't have woken from, being kept alive by countless machines and drugs, and then suddenly everything changed, Sam was brain dead, and John made the impossible choice to end one son's life to save the other.

_Oh god._

The very thought of his baby brother being sacrificed to save him made Dean begin to hyperventilate, to panic.

_He was at Stanford, he got away from this life, he was meant to be safe there._

_This wasn't meant to happen._

_It should've been me._

_I was meant to die, and he was meant to get a chance to be normal, to have a real family, a real home, the life he deserved._

_And now he's dead, it isn't right._

Suddenly Dean was pulled from his thoughts as the impala swerved onto the embankment at the side of the nearly abandoned road they were traveling on.

And then John was at his son's side, urging him to breathe, to calm down, apparently he'd fallen asleep, and awoken screaming out for Sam, crying out desperately for his baby brother.

* * *

Eventually they arrived at a small motel on the edge of a middle of nowhere town about six hours from Palo Alto. Dean was still weak from his illness and the operation, and so he was forced to wait in the backseat until his father appeared, and then he let himself be practically carried into the shabby motel room his father had rented for them to stay in that night, while they worked out what to do next.

* * *

Dean was asleep within minutes of his father helping him into one of the motel beds, but it wasn't long before he was once again, as he'd done every night since Sam's death, Dean woke up screaming.

Another nightmare.

It was much the same as the one he'd had the night his father had delivered the devastating news, and each night that followed.

A much younger Sam and Dean were sparring in the backyard of a place the Dean recognised as one they'd stayed in when Sam was eleven, Sam was still learning, and one minute everything was fine, then Dean knocked Sam to the ground, he fell hard, his head slammed into the ground, then John would come out to see what was happening, and then John'd be at Sam's side, looking up at Dean, telling him "He's dead, Dean. You killed him. He'd dead, and it's all your fault."

That was the nightmare, and it haunted Dean without fail every night, he didn't know it then, but for years to come he would be torn from his slumber by the same horrific scene.

Now sitting bolt upright in bed, his chest heaving, Dean struggled to get himself back under control, his chest felt like it was on fire from where his sternum had been spilt in half for the surgery, and was now being jarred by his irregular breaths. He probably shouldn't have even been out of the hospital, but he had to be at his baby brother's funeral, and he just couldn't bring himself to go back to the hospital, he'd spent far too long there, and it held too many unpleasant memories.

* * *

Being a naturally light sleeper, John woke up when he heard his adult son crying in the next bed, he knew from previous experience that trying to talk to Dean would only upset him further now, and eventually he would go back to sleep, for a while at least. But as he waited there, listening to his son's distress, it quickly became apparent that this wasn't like every other time, Dean's breathing was getting worse and worse, and by the time John sat up in his bed and looked over at Dean, his lips were tinged with blue, and in the dim lighting, his skin appeared bloodless.

* * *

Dialing the ambulance had become all too routine to John in the past year, and in just ten minutes a paramedic crew was leaning over Dean, giving him extra oxygen via a mask over his face, and then quickly loading him onto a gurney and into the waiting ambulance, with his toughened father hovering over them the whole time, feeding them whatever medical information they requested.

* * *

At the hospital, Dean was rushed straight back into the treatment area, while John was forcibly restricted to the waiting room. Back in the treatment room, a physician quickly worked to assess Dean, all the while talking to him. Through Dean's answers, and the information that the doctor already had, he stopped what he was doing, and turned to one of the nurses. "Get five milligrams of Ativan, but don't push it yet, I want to try something else first."  
"Sure." The nurse replied before turning on her heels, and moving over to the locked medication cabinet, and starting to draw up the sedative.

Meanwhile the doctor pulled over a stool, and sat down beside Dean. "I know it's hard right now, Dean, but I need you to really listen to me. You are having a panic attack, you need to slow your breathing down, so just look at me." The doctor made eye contact with Dean, and held it as he said. "Now, just breathe in and out, nice and slow. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out...." The doctor continued repeating these words until Dean started to respond, and slowly but surely his breathing slowed down, and with it his heart rate started to slow and his oxygen levels improved. "Good work, Dean. That's it, just keep breathing, nice and easy." The doctor encouraged Dean as he moved away from the bed to the nurse standing at the edge of the room. "He's stable now, how about you bring his dad back? And" He lowered his voice "give psych a call."

* * *

**TBC...**

**Thanks for reading! Please review!**

**And as always, suggestions and CONSTRUCTIVE criticism are welcome, feel free to put them in a review or PM.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or the characters, and chances are that I never will.**

**Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed the first chapter of this fic!**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

A minute later the nurse brought John back into the treatment room, and at the entrance to the room he was met by the doctor.

"How's my boy? Is he okay now?" John asked worriedly.

"Hello, sir, I'm Dr Cole. Dean's doing much better now, his heart rate's down and his saturations are much better. I think that today's incident was a panic attack, so physically he should be alright, but usually when someone has a severe panic attack like I just witnessed with Dean, something is causing it. Do you have any idea what that might be?"

John knew exactly what the doctor meant, he'd been worried that something like this would happen, he should've made Dean talk to him more, maybe he could've stopped this. "Can I talk to you outside, doc?"

"Of course." The doctor replied, leading John into the hallway.

"Dean's brother, Sam, he died three days ago, it was... he was left brain, brain dead." John choked out, despite his hard shell, he was still being torn apart by the fact that he would never see his baby boy anymore.

"Oh my..." Dr Cole began. "I'm so sorry for your loss, I can't begin to imagine how difficult this must be for you, and for Dean as well."  
John hesitated a moment before telling the doctor. "It's more than that. Sam was an organ donor, Dean's new heart... Sam, Dean..."

The doctor took a moment to catch on. "Um ...oh, OH. Oh dear sweet lord."

"I know, and I really wish things were different, but... There wasn't any other choice."

"Okay, well obviously the past week has been very rough on yourself and Dean, I've already paged the on call psychiatrist, and they should be down shortly to talk with you and Dean. Hopefully they'll be able to help." Dr Cole said, feeling more than a little out of his depth, and just wanting to get away, now.

* * *

Two and a half hours later, and the psychiatric physician finally showed up in the emergency department to see Dean, and after being briefed by a still uneasy Dr Cole, the senior psychiatrist, Dr Ross walked into Dean's room.

"Hello, Dean. I'm Dr Ross, from psychiatry, I'm sorry to keep you waiting, I had an emergency. You mind if your dad steps out for a while so we can talk?"

Dean glanced nervously between his father and the doctor. "I... I don't..." He stammered, but after a moment he said. "Okay, I guess."

"I'll be right outside, kiddo." John promised as he made his way out of the room, only to hover on the other side of the door.

As John left the room, Dr Ross sat down in the seat John had vacated at Dean's side, and attentively listening, ready for the answers that Dean may give, he asked. "We're a bit worried about you, Dean. What you've been feeling, it must be quite difficult. Do you want to tell me how this happened?"

Dean took a shaky breath, before he complied. "A year back, I got sick. The doctors back then said that it was an infection I'd picked up after having some work done to my teeth, and it went to my heart. They gave me a bunch of drugs, and for a while they worked, but then I got worse, landed myself in hospital, after that things get kind of blurry, next thing I know, my dad was telling me that I'd gotten a... a new heart, from" Dean still struggled to say it, he hit his head back against the back of the raised bed in frustration before continuing "from Sammy."

The doctor nodded thoughtfully, taking in everything his patient was telling him, after a brief pause, he asked. "Sammy, that's your younger brother, correct?"

Dean looked down at the bedspread, picking at a loose thread as he replied. "Yeah, he was."  
"Can you tell me about him? Were you close?"

Dean paused, a pained smile gracing his expression, lost in a memory. He looked up at the doctor, looking him directly in the eye as he said. "He was my baby brother. Our mom died when I was a kid, and it was just the three of us, we moved around a lot, so we never had friends, he was everything to me ...I would've died... I would've died for him." Dean paused for a minute, trying to maintain the speck of composure he had left. "He was so smart, got into Stanford on a full scholarship, he had a future, and now he's dead, and it's..." Dean trailed off, fighting against the pain that threatened to consume him. He failed. "It's not freakin' fair!" Dean screamed out. "He's gone, and I'm still here, and it's not fair..." Dean turned his head away from the doctor, tears blurring his vision. "It's not fair."

Dr Ross remained silent, he knew from experience that right now, this young man before him, he didn't need to hear empty platitudes, he just needed to get things off his chest, to grieve.

"It wasn't supposed to work out this way, Sam was meant to live his life, and I was meant to die. Instead he gets beaten to death trying to save a kid's life, and I wake up with his heart beating inside me. It's fucked up, and... I don't know how to deal with it. How is anything ever supposed to be normal again?"

"It may seem impossible at the moment, Dean, but with time, and probably some counseling I think you can get past this." Dr Ross said reassuringly

"Get past this?! What do you mean get past this!?! How the hell am I meant to get past this!? My baby brother is dead, he's dead, and you've lost your mind if you think I can ever be okay with that." Dean screamed, tears streaming down his face.

"I'm sorry, Dean. I didn't intend to upset you, I simply meant that I want to work with you, to help you grieve, and to help you get your life back together." Dr Ross said apologetically, he then told Dean. "I have to go back upstairs now, but what I want to do, is to make an appointment to speak with you in a couple of days, in my office. And I'll prescribe you something to help you get some real sleep, and to help with the panic attacks, try to get you feeling a bit more human. How's that sound?"

* * *

**TBC...**

**Thanks for reading! Please review!**

**And as always, suggestions and CONSTRUCTIVE criticism are welcome, feel free to put them in a review or PM.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or the characters, and chances are that I never will.**

**Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed the last chapter! And I just want to say that I'm really sorry this took so long, my computer died, I started a new job, and I've had a lot of assignments to do for my tafe course. I'm studying childcare, would you believe it?**

**I get the feeling that there's going to be a mixed reaction to the ending off this chapter, but try to see it for the opportunities it presents. Please!**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

Needless to say Dean accepted the medications without pause, anything to let him forget, just for awhile, but without the therapy Dr Ross informed Dean that he wouldn't prescribe him anything, so reluctantly Dean agreed to meet with the doctor in two days, to 'catch up' as Dr Ross had described it.

* * *

Half an hour later, Dean was finished with Dr Ross, and after another couple of hours John signed him out to go home, or back to the motel as the case was, and he then drove Dean back to the motel. On the ride home, John attempted to start up a conversation, and each and every time he tried, Dean replied with a mere grunt, a shrug of the shoulders, and a variety of other non-communicative responses. And once they reached the motel things didn't change much, with the help of the newly prescribed sedatives Dean was asleep within minutes, leaving John to his own devices.

John was barely keeping it together, between Sam's death, Dean's long running illness, and now Dean's devastation and mental collapse, it was almost too much for the eldest Winchester to handle. He grabbed a beer from the bar fridge, and slipped out of the motel room, and eventually he ended up sitting with his head in his hands at the top of the motel's stairs, thoughts rushing through his head.

_How could I let this happen?!_

_He's in so much pain._

_How am I supposed to help him?_

_It should be me, not some shrink he's talking to._

_I've already lost one son, please god don't let me lose Dean too._

Overwhelmed by the pain, John grabbed the empty beer bottle that was sitting beside him, and he hurled it across the parking lot. He was so frustrated, frustrated over feeling so useless to Dean, over the way his life was going. He'd always thought, right from the moment he'd met Mary that they'd always be together, that they'd have a family together, but now all that was crumbling down around him. And there sat John Winchester, hunter, father, and widower, crying brokenly on the steps of the motel, praying for it all to stop, for it to stop hurting, just even for a while.

* * *

Eventually John went inside, and he was relieved to find Dean still resting peacefully, he sat down beside his son, but as he sat down, he was compelled to place his fingers to Dean's neck, feeling for a pulse, just to be sure, his memories of the last time dean had been so still, when he was in a coma, would always haunt him.

John stayed there all night, by his son's side, just watching him, making sure he was alright.

* * *

He stayed there until well into the next morning, when Dean finally awoke from his medicated slumber. John had been dozing on his own bed when he noticed Dean starting to wake.

John quickly sat up and then made his way to Dean's side, greeting him as his eyes drifted open. "Hey kiddo. How're you feeling?"

There was a long pause before Dean mumbled. "Crap. Lemme alone." Before rolling away from his father, and closing his eyes trying to fall back asleep.

"No can do, Deano." John said regretfully. "You've got to get up and take your meds. Come on."

Sighing, knowing that his father was right, the last thing he wanted was to damage the heart inside him, Sam's heart, Dean pulled himself out of bed, and groggily followed his father into the kitchenette to take his morning cocktail of pills.

* * *

The next morning John and Dean made their way back to the hospital, Dean was still in his sleepwear, an old band shirt and a pair of track pants, because John had given up convincing him to get dressed. Within a few minutes of arriving, Dean was sitting opposite Dr Ross on the office's couches.

"So how have you been feeling, Dean? Are you sleeping any better?"

Dean still had dark bags under his eyes, but he had been sleeping better, now he only had to remember what had happened half the time. "Better I guess. I still keep waking up in the night though, nightmares." It wasn't true, but Dean was tired, and he knew what to say to talk the psychiatrist into giving him more meds, then he'd be able to just forget. He needed to forget.

It worked. "Okay, well I can increase your dosage, see if that helps. Can you tell me about the nightmares?"

Dean still had more than enough nightmares to tell the doctor about, though he did need to sensor it a bit. "We were out hunting deer, and there's a fence, Sam gets caught on one side and I'm on the other side, I can't get back to him." _This is crap._ "Then there's a noise, a gunshot, and Sam is falling to the ground. He dies there and I couldn't reach him. And there's another one, and in that one, I'm the one who beat Sam, I killed him with my bare hands."

Dr Ross was silent for a moment before he replied, considering what his patient had just told him, he didn't need his training to know that that was what it would ultimately come down to, Dean felt as though he had killed his brother, even though that couldn't be further from the truth.

* * *

Dean continued to go see Dr Ross every few days for the next couple of weeks, and then every week, then every two weeks, then he started missing appointments, all this time he kept taking the medications, well beyond the prescribed dosage a large proportion of the time, every time his memories of Sam became too much for him, which was very near constantly. He only saw Dr Ross now when he needed more meds, he'd tell him what he knew he needed to hear to write another script.

And John, well John he started drinking more and more, he could see his son slipping into a severe drug addiction, and consumed by the pain of everything that had happened, he couldn't cope.

They broke off all contact with everyone and then they went their separate ways, John took off, and Dean who had moved onto something stronger, namely methamphetamine, he had sold everything his father had left behind, everything except the Impala which was his only form of shelter as he moved from town to town, without fail, finding a dealer who could get him the only thing he cared about anymore.

* * *

**TBC...**

**Thanks for reading! Please review!**

**And as always, suggestions and CONSTRUCTIVE criticism are welcome, feel free to put them in a review or PM.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural, or the characters, and chances are that I never will.**

**Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed the last chapter! **

**Enjoy the final (very short) chapter!**

* * *

Dean continued to sick further and further into the addiction for a number of months, until late one night or maybe it was day, Dean couldn't really tell anymore, at the end of the laneway he was lying in, dean saw his dead brother, it wasn't the first time, but this time was different, slowly Sam moved towards him, a strange glow surrounding him.

"You're not here, you can't be real." Dean murmured as he looked up at his brother's form. "You died."

"I am here and I am very real, Dean. I am sorry that I left you alone, I couldn't just leave that guy there to be beaten to death, but just because I am gone, it doesn't mean that you should be trying to kill yourself with drugs, I died so that you could live, so that you could save lives. I haven't really left you Dean, you just haven't been looking, Dean, please just stop this, stop hurting yourself, trying to kill yourself. Please get your life back, for me."

Dean was silent for a long while before he said. "Okay, Sam. I'll stop using, for you."

Sam offered Dean a peaceful smile, before turning back towards the entrance he had come from.

"Hey wait! You're leaving?! You can't leave, I need you." Dean called out disbelievingly.

Sam turned back towards Dean. "I am not leaving you, I will never leave you. No matter what, I will be here for you, just out of sight sometimes."

* * *

Suddenly Sam was gone, and Dean was back in the backseat of the impala. _What the hell?! _Dean thought, he must have been hallucinating.

But then Sam was there again. "I am still here and you aren't hallucinating, Dean. I will always be here for you."

* * *

Three months later Dean walked out of rehab, clean and sober, to where John was waiting for him, sitting on the hood of the impala.

Seeing his son, John quickly went to greet him, and as he reached Dean, he embraced warmly in a fatherly way. "I'm proud of you, son."

"You too, Dad." Dean said genuinely, and he meant it, John was going on sixty days sober, and with Sam's spirit guiding him all the way, and Dean too, they were determined and on their way to getting their lives back together, for Sam.

* * *

**The End.**

**Thanks for reading! Please review!**

**And as always, suggestions and CONSTRUCTIVE criticism are welcome, feel free to put them in a review or PM.**


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